Dodge Complies With PETA By Replacing Ape With Invisible
Ape

By Ben PopkenAugust 12, 2010

PETA was mad at Dodge for running an ad that had a chimpanzee in it, considering the history of abuse monkeys have suffered in the entertainment industry. Not that any happened to this monkey, just to monkeys before it. In any event, in the revised version Dodge complied and digitally erased the monkey in the track suit…. but now there’s just a disembodied suit walking over and pressing the dynamite lever. Dexter’s Michael C. Hall monotones in the voiceover, “Oh wait, there’s an invisible monkey.” Hilarity!

BEFORE:

AFTER:

The first one was just meh, monkey joke. The revision is an act of surreal genius, and a giant finger to PETA pantywringers.

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“The first one was just meh, monkey joke. The revision is an act of surreal genius, and a giant finger to PETA pantywringers.”

Yeah. I’m a member of PeTA but I have to ask, don’t you guys have some horrific pet stores or university animals experiments to shut down? Can’t you leave Hollywood alone, since laws have been made and complied with for many years now?

Well, considering that there are thousands upon thousands of unwanted animals, at least I hope they give them a humane end. It’s sad, but kill shelters do this too. There’s just too many puppies and kitties in the world.

Personally, breeders should be shut down. Breeding MORE animals because you can sell them for some assumed worth is worse, when there are hundreds of animals in shelters with no pedigree looking for a loving home.

While pet overpopulation might not be entirely myth, it is definitely exaggerated, mostly by animal rights groups such as PETA and marginally the HSUS; and to a lesser extent by well-meaning but defensive animal welfare advocates. Read Nathan Winograd’s book Redemption* for his accounts of communities that have achieved no kill by adopting progressive policies for animal sheltering and welfare.

Demand for puppy mills is in no small part a result of regressive and hostile consumer practices within the animal welfare/rights community. When communities come together to make systemic changes in the way they treat both animals and people, they can make huge strides toward reducing or even eliminating the killing of healthy, adoptable animals.

* Read the book, not just the hysterical, name-calling animal rightist arguments against no kill philosophy. Remember that their ultimate goal is the complete extinction of domestic animals, and most of their policies and claims are geared toward achieving that goal.

The difference is PETA will actively seek out animals, lie to the people they take them from and tell them they’ll give them a home (sometimes even faking photos of the animals in new homes), and then kill them without ever advertising them for adoption.

A real shelter? Does not do that. A shelter takes in only animals surrendered to it, admits that they will try their best but may not find a home, and advertises the animal in it’s shelter (and usually in adoption events and on websites like petfinder.org)

And I have to disagree with you. PETA is not the most tame; did you miss everyone’s comments about them killing most of the animals placed into their care?. Look into animal welfare organizations, like the Humane Society or the SPCA. Those are the groups that actually help the animals.

Greenpeace isn’t an animal rights organization, but they do more to save animals than PETA does.

Which, interestingly, a TON of PETA members don’t even realize that PETA doesn’t want you to have pets. I prefer the ASPCA because it stands for doing the right thing and caring properly for animals in your care. As for not having them at all, I think that idea would really upset my dog. I’ve served him meals, picked up his messes, and showered him with toys and treats for as long as he can remember. I think it would be quite a shock if someone informed him that he was my unwilling slave. As far as he is concerned, I was created for the sole purpose of catering to his every whim.

My cat sings to me. Lulling me into petting her. Like a siren of the sea, she is. I am so in her thrall it’s pathetic. And the falling-on-the-floor-rolling-over-turning-upside-down maneuver is used quite frequently to get my attention. Just remember that cats don’t have owners, they have assistants.

I have to agree with that. Most domestic animals have been bred to be pets. Most cats or dogs wouldn’t survive on their own because they don’t have the instincts anymore.

I would have more respect for PETA if they moderated their policy in regards to keeping pets. The ASPCA and local humane societies IMO do much better work, especially in educating people about their responsibilities to their pets.

I also am a fan of their neutering/spaying campaign because there are too many unwanted cats and dogs in shelters because their people chose not to get them fixed. I understand keeping show and breeding animals intact, but if you have no intent to show or breed them and they’re going to be pets, get them fixed.

I have three cats and a dog, all fixed. The two indoor cats have us trained to feed them when they want to be fed. The dog also has it pretty good. He gets first choice of any spot on the couch and most toys he wants. We usually sit around him, even when family is visiting. My aunt who doesn’t like big dogs thinks we indulge him too much, but he’s worth it. He’s a good companion, especially for exercising.

Just like they shut down the monks’ egg production that had supported the monastery for over 60 years. It was easier to harass people who would greet them with a prayer rather than go after the 3 hunt clubs (one practically across the street from Mepkin Abbey, the other 2 within 10 miles) that hold canned hunts…where they’d have been greeted with guys with shotguns.

I LOVE how deadpan it was. I think because it was all “oooh circusy!” the deadpan delivery was a nice contrast. Also, Michael C. Hall could read a phonebook and I’d still wonder whether he was just reading the phonebook or looking up Dexter’s next victim.

PETA pulls media stunts like this in order to get media coverage and name recognition. And it works. Look at how many people here see the name, recognize them from previous media blitzes like the ‘sea kittens’ thing, or their naked lady campaigns, and spread the word around.

It’s working right here, right now. Sure, people will talk trash about them, but it gets their name out there, where gullible and ignorant people remember it and form vague associations between PETA and fighting animal abuse and such, and some subset of those people end up giving them enough money to continue their campaigns, both the media coverage ones, and the even more horrific ones, where they kill healthy, adoptable animals to save them from happy lives with loving, responsible families.

There’s a first time for everything, and that probably includes PETA being sensible and in the right.

Chimpanzees are wild animals, they don’t get domesticated like dogs and cats (remember this?). When they reach puberty and adolescence, they become willful, sometimes violent, and essentially uncontrollable. So they’re only useful when they’re juveniles, at an age where the mothers won’t voluntarily let them be taken off by humans to be dressed up in outfits and trained to push down plungers. That’s why the mothers have historically been killed, or at least drugged.

If nothing else, think about this: Chrysler could have gotten PR brownie points by demonstrating that this particular chimpanzee has been well-treated. Throwing up a fine-print disclaimer of “No animals were harmed in the making of this advertisement” is cheaper and easier than digitally erasing the chimp. But their lawyers won’t let them make statements they can’t back up.

PETA probably has no proof that this particular chimpanzee has been harmed, but why isn’t Chrysler trying to claim it hasn’t?

There has been a history of abusing animals for entertainment, sure. But not by Dodge nor the advertising agency it hired. So why should Dodge have to refuse every accusation some crackpot organization throws its way? That’s like saying I have to prove to anyone who asks that I’m not an alcoholic because people of Irish descent have a history of abusing alcohol.

Because you can’t reason with crazy. PETA will hear what it wants to hear and saying you aren’t mistreating the animal isn’t going to get PETA off your back because PETA doesn’t want you featuring an animal at all. It thinks you’re being cruel. No reasoning with crazy here. Dodge did the smart thing. PETA wanted it to pull the commercial entirely; how much
money would that have wasted? Instead, the company capitalized on an ad it had already made and showed that it wouldn’t cave to PETA’s silly demands.

Ok, so just how stupid a question makes it past the “there are no stupid questions” myth? You are the winnah! Come on people, not every idea or cause has merit. PETA deserves nothing but scorn and ridicule.

They are good for a laugh once in a while, though, As are most village idiots.

That commercial is on every morning as I get ready for work. For the past week, it’s been the “invisible monkey” – and as I set there and watch… I was trying to think if it was always that, or was I just losing my mind… since I did not remember it being “invisible” last week….

… of course like I said, on every morning as I get ready for work… so I’m not fully awake anyway.

Great, another WAH-fest about PETA. Go ahead, you sheep. Talk about how much you hate PETA. Give them more and more attention. This kind of story HELPS PETA. You complaining about them HELPS them. They do things like this and the Sea Kittens thing specifically to get sheep like you to complain and spread it around. This helps them get donations because, whether you think it’s ridiculous or not, their message reaches more people.

I have shelter pets and I do occasional animal-related volunteer work, and I get all up-in-arms about animal mistreatment (don’t get me going on the circus, OK). However, I have no reason to believe that the animal in this commercial has ever been mistreated.

+1 for Dodge for coming up with such a hilarious solution to PETA’s ridiculous demands. “Yeah…we’ll stop using the monkey, but not the way you expect. HA!”

I say bring on more invisible moneys. I’d like to see (not see?) this guy as Dodge’s new invisible spokesperson.

Considering the whole ad campaign seems to be targeting “manly men” and that demographic typically isn’t very sympathetic to PETA, I think this was a genius way to placate both PETA and their target demographic. The fact that the invisible monkey is called out as such takes the cake in my book.